Visionary Gazette
Present by: Laurel Ann Browne
Galactic Cosmology and the 2012 end-date alignment.
This has been a most fruitful avenue of research in my continuing efforts to get to the
heart of the ancient Maya's cosmological wisdom. Since 1993 I have been building
evidence for the idea that the Maya were aware of our solstice sun's impending
alignment with the Galactic Plane and the Galactic Center, an astronomical alignment
that occurs only once every 13,000 years. I have honestly documented my encounter
with this idea and have gone deep into the academic literature to decode how this end-
date alignment scenario - what I call the Galactic Cosmology- was incorporated into
basic Maya institutions such as the ballgame, king accession rites, and the Maya Creation
Myth. Four years of intense research along these lines, during which I wrote several
monographs and a dozen articles, culminated in the publication of Maya Cosmogenesis
2012 in 1998. MC2012 has been lauded as revolutionary, original, and pioneering by
many respected cutting-edge thinkers of our day.
Endorsements and Reviews
"A revolutionary work of discovery and synthesis."
- Terence McKenna, from the Foreword
"In Maya Cosmogenesis 2012, author John Major Jenkins has combined his gift for
incisive, mythic and symbolic interpretation with rigorous research, to reveal the Mayan
calendar as a world cosmology and spiritual philosophy, firmly grounded in precise
observations of celestial patterns and rhythms. According to Jenkins' in depth yet
accessible and often poetic analysis, the Maya had reconciled a number of planetary and
sidereal cycles to accurately define the passage of our earth and solar system, as it
moves through millennia, in and out of alignment with the galactical core and equator.
This vast, celestial conjunction, so central to the Mayan sages and astronomers, holds
profound transformative implications for individuals and civilization today."
- Robert Lawlor, author of Sacred Geometry and Voices of the First Day, and co-
translator of Schwaller de Lubicz's The Temple of Man.
"With his better than academic decoding of the mysterious Maya glyphs that incorporate
both their colorful mythology and sophisticated astronomy, John Major Jenkins has
validated that shamans, with their out-of-body clairvoyance, were responsible for the
amazing accuracy of Mayan and other Mesoamerican calendar systems that cover
thousands of years of earthly, planetary, and galactic motion. That Mayan deities
represent astronomical bodies, as did the pantheons of Egypt and Mesopotamia, is
equally validated by Jenkins. His emphasis on the famous Long Count calendar shows
that when the rising sun on the December solstice of the year 2012 conjuncts with the
Milky Way’s galactic center - or birth canal of the Great Mother of us all - a new age is
expected, one in which humanity will mutate spiritually into a new relationship with
space-time and the material universe."
- Peter Tompkins, author of Mysteries of the Mexican Pyramids and The Secret Life of
Nature.
Meticulously and exhaustively researched, carefully written, this book's patiently arrived
at (but never jumped to) highly original conclusions have both the weight and the ring
of that authority found only in the very best scholarship. Unlike other books devoted to
decoding the Mayan 'prophecies' it also has a potentially happy ending.
- John Anthony West, author of Serpent in the Sky
"The extensive research by John Major Jenkins into the Mayan mysteries is very
impressive indeed, and his book will no doubt become a classic in this field of study.
Maya Cosmogenesis 2012 is a must read for all those who feel that there is far more
to our ancient past than meets the eye."
- Robert Bauval, co-author of The Orion Mystery and The Message of the Sphinx
The basis for Jenkins' reconstruction is a meticulous search behind the Mayan belief
system which led him to deciphering the Hero Twin Myth in the Popol Vuh, the Ball
Court symbology, and the Long Count system used to predict the precession of the
galactic center. All of this took the Mayan priests many thousands of years to perfect,
and a thousand man-hours by Jenkins to understand... This is a book with a rich sense
of our spiritual evolution that only John Jenkins can state so eloquently."
- Willard Van de Bogart, Director of The Portal Market online
"With Jenkins' scholarly effort of comparative calendric research and investigation into
Mayan cosmology, we may all ascend to new levels of insight concerning the wealth of
coded messages that remain in the Mayan legacy to modern mankind in this age of
transformation."
-Jim Reed, The Institue of Maya Studies
"...a well-researched psychoarcheological and astronomical excursion into the Mayan
mind field of time."
-Dr. Jose Arguelles, author of The Mayan Factor.
"Without the grants, funds, and job securities of the astronomers and archaeologists
who dominate this field of inquiry, John Major Jenkins offers us a clear-headed piece of
well-documented research on the astrological and cosmological genius of ancient
Mesoamerica. His book provides an excellent analysis of the generally misunderstood
Mayan Calendar which burst onto the New Age scene with the Harmonic Convergence
of 1987. Using facts, not fancies, Jenkins leads us into the complex world of
Mesoamerican iconography, cosmology, astrology and astronomy, and shows us how
ancient insights are relevant to today's world."
- Bruce Scofield, author of Day-Signs and Signs of Time
"John Major Jenkins' Maya Cosmogenesis 2012 presents a fascinating, meticulously
researched, exquisitely reasoned, scholarly yet readable account of the development
of ancient Mesoamerican astro-spirituality, and offers an inspiring poetic vision of
humanity's future."
- Douglas Gillette, author of The Shaman's Secret
"Jenkins presents a wealth of information about Maya astronomy, mythology, and
calendrics in support of his analysis of the Long Count calendar end-date . . . 200
illustrations, maps, end notes, and an extensive bibliography complement this detailed
work."
- The Library Journal
"Building on the pioneering work of de Santillana and von Dechend (Hamlet’s Mill) and
Linda Schele (Maya Cosmos), repeatedly testing his own observations at key sites,
Jenkins here lays out the impressive results of fourteen years of dedicated study and
inspired synthesis."
- Stephen Eberhard, Professor of Mathematics at California State University
"Jenkins’ findings not only extend our understanding of Maya cosmology, they have
great significance for humanity at the evolutionary crossroads." - Nexus Magazine
"John Major Jenkins’ voluminous new work excavates a Mesoamerican cosmogony
shrouded in mystery and entombed in fantastic symbols. This is the amazing story of
the evolution of cosmology in the Americas as a people, sometimes referred to as "the
skywatchers," searched for the ultimate cosmic center and the hour of ultimate cosmic
opportunity."
- Kathie Garcia for Atlantis Rising Magazine
"A scholarly and insightful investigation into the fascinating cosmology of the ancient
Maya, written by a leading independent researcher on Mesoamerican astrology and
calendar studies... a well-researched and convincing argument that the Maya anchored
their great calednar system to the precessional alignment of the winter solstice Sun with
the center of the Milky Way galaxy."
- Valerie Vaughan, author of Astro-Mythology: The Celestial Union of Astrology and
Myth
A fascinating and in the end, uplifting book. I consider it to be the Hamlet's Mill of
Mayan cosmology and I sincerely hope that it will serve as a departure point for future
researchers.
- Rick Martin in Fairfield, CT
"Brilliant scholarship, amazing talent and an intuitive feeling for Mayan thought make
this book very significant in understanding the importance of Dec. 21 (Solstice) 2012
as an end and beginning date in our human journey."
- Elizabeth Gips of Changes Radio, Santa Cruz
In his final analysis, author John Major Jenkins offers hope; for uncovered in his Maya
calender research is the quickening dawn of a new age for humankind. If you're
interested in ancient mysteries and their relevance to our present time and near future,
then this intelligent work is for you...
Insightful, well-written and researched with great integrity. John Major Jenkins offers a
conclusion, which when fully realized in the reader's mind, seems ineluctable --- a
quickening dawn of a new age for humankind. I recommend this work to all persons
interested in ancient mysteries and their present day implications.
- R. Kiffin Hope
THE HOW AND WHY OF THE MAYAN END DATE IN 2012 A.D.
by John Major Jenkins
Copyright. May 23rd, 1994
Originally published in the Dec-Jan '95 issue of Mountain Astrologer.
Why did the ancient Mayan or pre-Maya choose December 21st, 2012 A.D., as the end
of their Long Count calendar? This article will cover some recent research. Scholars
have known for decades that the 13-baktun cycle of the Mayan "Long Count" system of
timekeeping was set to end precisely on a winter solstice, and that this system was put
in place some 2300 years ago. This amazing fact - that ancient Mesoameri- can
skywatchers were able to pinpoint a winter solstice far off into the future - has not
been dealt with by Mayanists. And why did they choose the year 2012? One immediately
gets the impression that there is a very strange mystery to be confronted here. I will be
building upon a clue to this mystery reported by epigrapher Linda Schele in Maya
Cosmos (1994). This article is the natural culmination of the research relating to the
Mayan Long Count and the precession of the equinoxes that I explored in my recent
book Tzolkin: Visionary Perspectives and Calendar Studies (Borderlands Science and
Research Foundation, 1994).
The Mayan Long Count
Just some basics to get us started. The Maya were adept skywatchers. Their Classic
Period is thought to have lasted from 200 A.D. to 900 A.D., but recent archeological
findings are pushing back the dawn of Mayan civilization in Mesoamerica. Large ruin
sites indicating high culture with distinctly Mayan antecedents are being found in the
jungles of Guatemala dating back to before the common era. And even before this, the
Olmec civilization flourished and developed the sacred count of 260 days known as the
tzolkin. The early Maya adopted two different time keeping systems, the "Short Count"
and the Long Count. The Short Count derives from combining the tzolkin cycle with the
solar year and the Venus cycle of 584 days. In this way, "short" periods of 13, 52 and
104 years are generated. Unfortunately, we won't have occasion to dwell on the
properties of the so-called Short Count system here. The Long Count system is
somewhat more abstract, yet is also related to certain astronomical cycles. It is based
upon nested cycles of days multiplied at each level by that key Mayan number, twenty:
Number of Days / Term
1 / Kin (day)
20 / Uinal
360 / Tun
7200 / Katun
144000 / Baktun
Notice that the only exception to multiplying by twenty is at the tun level, where the
uinal period is instead multiplied by 18 to make the 360-day tun. The Maya employed
this counting system to track an unbroken sequence of days from the time it was
inaugurated. The Mayan scholar Munro Edmonson believes that the Long Count was put
in place around 355 B.C. This may be so, but the oldest Long Count date as yet found
corresponds to 32 B.C. We find Long Count dates in the archeological record beginning
with the baktun place value and separated by dots. For example: 6.19.19.0.0 equals 6
baktuns, 19 katuns, 19 tuns, 0 uinals and 0 days. Each baktun has 144000 days, each
katun has 7200 days, and so on. If we add up all the values we find that 6.19.19.0.0
indicates a total of 1007640 days have elapsed since the Zero Date of 0.0.0.0.0. The
much discussed 13-baktun cycle is completed 1872000 days (13 baktuns) after
0.0.0.0.0. This period of time is the so called Mayan "Great Cycle" of the Long Count
and equals 5125.36 years.
But how are we to relate this to a time frame we can understand? How does this Long
Count relate to our Gregorian calendar? This problem of correlating Mayan time with
"western" time has occupied Mayan scholars since the beginning. The standard question
to answer became: what does 0.0.0.0.0 (the Long Count "beginning" point) equal in
the Gregorian calendar? When this question is answered, archeological inscriptions can
be put into their proper historical context and the end date of the 13-baktun cycle can
be calculated. After years of considering data from varied fields such as astronomy,
ethnography, archeology and iconography, J. Eric S. Thompson determined that
0.0.0.0.0 correponded to the Julian date 584283, which equals August 11th, 3114 B.C.
in our Gregorian calendar. This means that the end date of 13.0.0.0.0, some 5125 years
later, is December 21st, 2012 A.D.1
The relationship between the Long Count and Short Count has always been internally
consistent (both were tracked alongside each other in an unbroken sequence since their
conception). Now it is very interesting to note that an aspect of the "Short Count",
namely, the sacred tzolkin count of 260 days, is still being followed in the highlands of
Guatemala. As the Mayan scholar Munro Edmonson shows in The Book of the Year, this
last surviving flicker of a calendar tradition some 3000 years old supports the
Thompson correlation of 584283. Edmonson also states that the Long Count was begun
by the Maya or pre-Maya around 355 B.C., but there is reason to believe that the Long
Count system was being perfected for at least 200 years prior to that date.
The point of interest for these early astronomers seems to have been the projected end
date in 2012 A.D., rather than the beginning date in 3114 B.C. Having determined the
end date in 2012 (for reasons we will come to shortly), and calling it 13.0.0.0.0, they
thus proclaimed themselves to be living in the 6th baktun of the Great Cycle. The later
Maya certainly attributed much mythological significance to the beginning date, relating
it to the birth of their deities, but it now seems certain that the placement of the Long
Count hinges upon its calculated end point. Why did early Mesoamerican skywatchers
pick a date some 2300 years into the future and, in fact, how did they pinpoint an
accurate winter solstice? With all these considerations one begins to suspect that, for
some reason, the ancient New World astronomers were tracking precession.
The Precession
The precession of the equinoxes, also known as the Platonic Year, is caused by the slow
wobbling of the earth's polar axis. Right now this axis roughly points to Polaris, the
"Pole Star," but this changes slowly over long periods of time. The earth's wobble
causes the position of the seasonal quarters to slowly precess against the background
of stars. For example, right now, the winter solstice position is in the constellation of
Sagittarius. But 2000 years ago it was in Capricorn. Since then, it has precessed
backward almost one full sign. It is generally thought that the Greek astronomer
Hipparchus was the first to discover precession around 128 B.C. Yet scholarship
indicates that more ancient Old World cultures such as the Egyptians (see Schwaller de
Lubicz's book Sacred Science) and Babylonians also knew about the precession.
I have concluded that even cultures with simple horizon astronomy and oral records
passed down for a hundred years or so, would notice the slow shifting of the heavens.
For example, imagine that you lived in an environment suited for accurately demarcated
horizon astronomy. Even if this wasn't the case, you might erect monoliths to sight the
horizon position of, most likely, the dawning winter solstice sun. This position in relation
to background stars could be accurately preserved in oral verse or wisdom teachings, to
be passed down for centuries. Since precession will change this position at the rate of 1
degree every 72 years, within the relatively short time of 100 years or so, a noticeable
change will have occurred. The point of this is simple. To early cultures attuned to the
subtle movements of the sky, precession would not have been hard to notice.2
The Maya are not generally credited with knowing about the precession of the
equinoxes. But considering everything else we know about the amazing sophistication
of Mesoamerican astronomy, can we realistically continue to deny them this? Many of
the as yet undeciphered hieroglyphs may ultimately describe precessional myths.
Furthermore, as I show in my book Tzolkin: Visionary Perspectives and Calendar
Studies, the Long Count is perfectly suited for predicting future seasonal quarters,
indefinitely, and precession is automatically accounted for. Some of the most incredible
aspects of Mayan cosmo-conception are just now being discovered. As was the case
with the state of Egyptology in the 1870's, we still have a lot to learn. In addition,
Mayanists like Gordon Brotherston (The Book of the Fourth World) consider
precessional knowledge among Mesoamerican cultures to be more than likely.
The Sacred Tree
We are still trying to answer these questions: What is so important about the winter
solstice of 2012 and, exactly how were calculations made so accurately, considering
that precession should make them exceedingly difficult?
If we make a standard horoscope chart for December 21st, 2012 A.D., nothing very
unusual appears. In this way I was led astray in my search until Linda Schele provided a
clue in the recent book Maya Cosmos. Probably the most exciting breakthrough in this
book is her identification of the astronomical meaning of the Mayan Sacred Tree.
Drawing from an impressive amount of iconographic evidence, and generously sharing
the process by which she arrived at her discovery, the Sacred Tree is found to be none
other than the crossing point of the ecliptic with the band of the Milky Way. Indeed, the
Milky Way seems to have played an important role in Mayan imagery. For example, an
incised bone from 8th century Tikal depicts a long sinking canoe containing various
deities. This is a picture of the night sky and the canoe is the Milky Way, sinking below
the horizon as the night progresses, and carrying with it deities representing the nearby
constellations. The incredible Mayan site of Palenque is filled with Sacred Tree motifs
and references to astronomical events. In their book Forest of Kings, Schele and Freidel
suggested that the Sacred Tree referred to the ecliptic. Apparently that was only part of
the picture, for the Sacred Tree that Pacal ascends in death is more than just the
ecliptic, it is the sacred doorway to the underworld. The crossing point of Milky Way
and ecliptic is this doorway and represents the sacred source and origin. In the
following diagram of the well known sarcophagus carving, notice that the Milky Way
tree serves as an extension of Pacal's umbilicus. The umbilicus is a human being's
entrance into life, and entrance into death as well:
Diagram 1: Pacal and the Sacred Tree.
We may also remember at this point that the tzolkin calendar is said to spring from the
Sacred Tree. The Sacred Tree is, in fact, at the center of the entire corpus of Mayan
Creation Myths. We should definitely explore the nature of this astronomical feature.
The first question that came up for me was as follows. Since Lord (Ahau) Pacal is, by
way of divine kingship, equated with the sun, and he is portrayed "entering" the Sacred
Tree on his famous sarcophagus lid, on what day does the sun come around to
conjunct the crossing point of ecliptic and Milky Way? This would be an important date.
In the pre-dawn skies of this date, the Milky Way would be seen to arch overhead from
the region of Polaris (Heart of Sky) and would point right at where the sun rises. This
(and the corollary date 6 months later) is the only date when the Sun/Lord could jump
from the ecliptic track and travel the Milky Way up and around the vault of heaven to
the region of Polaris, there to enter the "Heart of Sky." It should be mentioned that
1300 years ago, during the zenith of Palenque's glory, Polaris was much less an exact
"Pole Star" than it is now. Schele demonstrates that it wasn't a Pole Star that the Maya
mythologized in this regard, it was the unmarked polar "dark region" symbolizing death
and the underworld around which everything was observed to revolve. Life revolves
around death - a characteristically Mayan belief. The dates on which the sun conjuncts
the "Sacred Tree" are thus very important. These dates will change with precession.
Schele doesn't pursue this line of reasoning, however, and doesn't even mention that
these dates might be significant. If we go back to 755 A.D., we find that the sun
conjuncts the Sacred Tree on December 3rd. I should point out here that the Milky Way
is a wide band, and perhaps a 10-day range of dates should be considered.
To start with, however, I use the exact center of the Milky Way band that one finds on
star charts, known as the "Galactic Equator" (not to be confused with Galactic Center).
Where the Galactic Equator crosses the ecliptic in Sagittarius just happens to be where
the dark rift in the Milky Way begins. This is a dark bifurcation in the Milky Way caused
by interstellar dust clouds. To observers on earth, it appears as a dark road which
begins near the ecliptic and stretches along the Milky Way up towards Polaris. The Maya
today are quite aware of this feature; the Quich» Maya call it xibalba be (the "road to
Xibalba") and the Chorti Maya call it the "camino de Santiago". In Dennis Tedlock's
translation of the Popol Vuh, we find that the ancient Maya called it the "Black Road".
The Hero Twins Hunahpu and Xbalanque must journey down this road to battle the
Lords of Xibalba. (Tedlock 334, 358). Furthermore, what Schele has identified as the
Sacred Tree was known to the ancient Quich» simply as "Crossroads."
This celestial feature was not marginal in ancient Mayan thought and is still rec- ognized
even today. In terms of how this feature was mythologized, it seems that when a
planet, the sun, or the moon entered the dark cleft of the Milky Way in Sagittarius
(which happens to be the exact center of the Milky Way, the Galactic Equator), entrance
to the underworld road was possible, which could then take the journeyer up to the
Heart of Sky. Shamanic vision rites were probably involved in this scenario. In the
Yucatan, underground caves were ritual places used by shaman to journey to the
underworld. Schele explains that "Mayan mythology identifies the Road to Xibalba as
going through a cave" (Forest of Kings, 209). Here we have a metaphorical reference to
the "dark rift" in the Milky Way by way of its terrestrial counterpart, a syncretism
between earth and sky which is characteristic of Mayan thinking. Above all, what is
becoming apparent from the corpus of Mayan Creation Myths is that creation seems to
have taken place at a celestial crossroads - the crossing point of ecliptic and Milky Way.
To clarify this ever growing picture, we should stop here and plot out some charts. In
addition to the detailed star maps from Norton's 2000.0 Star Atlas which allowed me to
pinpoint the crossing point of Galactic Equator and ecliptic, I use EZCosmos to plot
these positions3. What I found answers the question of why the Maya chose the winter
solstice of 2012, a problem seemingly avoided by astronomers and Mayanists alike.
While it is true that the sun conjuncts the Sacred Tree on December 3rd in the year 755
A.D., over the centuries precession has caused the conjunction date to approach the
winter solstice. So, how close are we to perfect conjunction today? Exactly when might
we expect the winter solstice sun to conjunct the crossing point of Galactic Equator and
ecliptic - the Mayan Sacred Tree? Any astronomer will tell you that, presently, the Milky
Way crosses the ecliptic through the constellation of Sagittarius and this area is rich in
nebulae and high density objects. In fact, where the Milky Way crosses the ecliptic in
Sagittarius also happens to be the direction of the Galactic Center.4
The Charts
So the quest returns to identifying why December 21st, 2012 A.D. might represent
some kind of astronomical anomoly. I'll get right to the heart of the matter. Let's look at
a few charts.
Chart 1.
Here is a full view of the sky at noon on December 21st, 2012 A.D. The band of the
Milky Way can be seen stretching from the lower right to the upper left. The more or
less vertical dotted line indicates the Galactic Equator. The planets can be seen tracing a
roughly horizontal path through the chart, indicating the ecliptic. The sun, quite
strikingly, is dead center in the Sacred Tree. Let's look closer.
Chart 2.
The field is now reduced from a horizon-to-horizon view to a field of 30 degrees. Part
of the constellation of Sagittarius can be seen in the lower left portion of the chart. The
planet in the middle-to-upper left portion of the chart is Pluto, which rarely travels
directly along the ecliptic. The center square near the sun is placed on the Trifid Nebula
(M20). According to the star chart I used, this nebula is very close to the crossing point
of Galactic Equator and ecliptic. However, a small star (4 Sgr) is even closer; it sits right
on the Galactic Equator and its declination is only 00 .08' below the ecliptic. Let's look
closer at these features.
Chart 3.
The field is now reduced to a 5-degree span, what astrology considers to be within
conjunction. The dot to the lower right of the sun is the star 4 Sgr. Amazingly, the Sun
is right on target. We couldn't have hoped for a closer conjunction. 1 day before or
after will remove the sun a noticeable distance from the crossing point. December 21st,
2012 (13.0.0.0.0 in the Long Count) therefore represents an extremely close
conjunction of the winter solstice sun with the crossing point of Galactic Equator and
the ecliptic, what the ancient Maya recognized as the Sacred Tree. It is critical to
understand that the winter solstice sun rarely conjuncts the Sacred Tree. In fact, this is
an event that has been coming to resonance very slowly over thousands and thousands
of years. What this might mean astrologically, how this might effect the "energy
weather" on earth, must be treated as a separate topic.
But I should at least mention in passing that this celestial convergence appears to
parallel the accelerating pace of human civilization. It should be noted that because
precession is a very slow process, similar astronomical alignments will be evident on the
winter solstice dates within perhaps 5 years on either side of 2012. However, the
accuracy of the conjunction of 2012 is quite astounding, beyond anything deemed
calculable by the ancient Maya, and serves well to represent the perfect mid-point of the
process.
Let's go back to the dawn of the Long Count and try to reconstruct what may have
been happening.
Why: Winter Solstice Sun Conjuncts The Sacred Tree in 2012 A.D.
First, the tzolkin count originated among the Olmec at least as early as 679 B.C. (see
Edmonson's Book of the Year). We may suspect that astronomical observations were
being made from at least that point. The tzolkin count has been followed unbroken
since at least that time, up to the present day, demonstrating the high premium placed
by the Maya upon continuity of tradition. In this way, star records, horizon positions of
the winter solstice sun, and other pertinent observations could also have been
accurately preserved. As suggested above, precession can be noticed by way of even
simple horizon astronomy in as little time as 100 to 150 years. (Hipparchus, the alleged
"discoverer" of precession among the Greeks, compared his own observations with data
collected only 170 years before his time.) Following Edmonson, the Long Count system
may have appeared as early as 355 B.C. Part of the reason for implementing the Long
Count system, as I will show, was probably to calculate future winter solstice dates.
We must assume that even at this early point in Mesoamerican history, the crossing
point of ecliptic and Milky Way was understood as the "Sacred Tree". Since the Sacred
Tree concept is intrinsically tied into the oldest Mayan Creation Myths, this is not
improbable. At the very least, the "dark rift" was already a recognized feature. Early
skywatchers of this era (355 B.C.) would then observe the sun to conjunct the dark
ridge in the Milky Way on or around November 18th.5 This would be easily observed in
the pre-dawn sky as described above: the Milky Way points to the rising sun on this
date.
Over a relatively short period of time, as an awareness of precession was emerging, this
date was seen to slowly approach winter solstice, a critical date in its own right in early
Mayan cosmo-conception. At this point, precession and the rate of precession was
calculated, the Long Count was perfected and inaugurated, and the appropriate winter
solstice date in 2012 A.D. was found via the Long Count in the following way.
How: Long Count and Seasonal Quarters
Long Count katun beginnings will conjunct sequential seasonal quarters every 1.7.0.0.0
days (194400 days). This is an easily tracked Long Count interval. Starting with the
katun beginning of 650 B.C.:
Long Count Which Quarter? Year
6.5.0.0.0 Fall 650 B.C.
7.12.0.0.0 Winter 118 B.C.
8.19.0.0.0 Spring 416 A.D.
10.6.0.0.0 Summer 948 A.D.
11.13.0.0.0 Fall 1480 A.D.
13.0.0.0.0 Winter 2012 A.D.
Note that the last date is not only a katun beginning, but a baktun beginning as well. It
is, indeed, the end date of 2012.6
The Long Count may have been officially inaugurated on a specific date in 355 B.C., as
Edmonson suggests, but it must have been formulated, tried, tested, and proven before
this date. This may well have taken centuries, and the process no doubt paralleled (and
was perhaps instigated by) the discovery of precession. The Long Count system
automatically accounts for precession in its ability to calculate future seasonal quarters -
a property which shouldn't be underestimated.
Summary
This has been my attempt to fill a vacuum in Mayan Studies, an answer to the why and
how of the end date of the 13-baktun cycle of the Mayan Long Count. The solution
requires a shift in how we think about the astronomy of the Long Count end date. The
strange fact that it occurs on a winter solstice immediately points us to possible
astronomical reasons, but they are not obvious. We also shouldn't forget the often
mentioned fact that the 13-baktun cycle of some 5125 years is roughly 1/5th of a
precessional cycle. This in itself should have been suggestive of a deeper mystery very
early on. Only with the recent identification of the astronomical nature of the Sacred
Tree has the puzzle revealed its fullness. And once again we are amazed at the
sophistication and vision of the ancient New World astronomers, the decendants of
whom still count the days and watch the skies in the remote outbacks of Guatemala.
This essay is not contrived upon sketchy evidence. It basically rests upon two facts:
1) the well known end date of the 13-baktun cycle of the Mayan Long Count, which is
December 21st, 2012 A.D. and
2) the astronomical situation on that day. Based upon these two facts alone, the
creators of the Long Count knew about and calculated the rate of precession over 2300
years ago. I can conceive of no other conclusion. To explain this away as "coincidence"
would only obscure the issue.
For early Mesoamerican skywatchers, the slow approach of the winter solstice sun to
the Sacred Tree was seen as a critical process, the culmination of which was surely
worthy of being called 13.0.0.0.0, the end of a World Age. The channel would then be
open through the winter solstice doorway, up the Sacred Tree, the Xibalba be , to the
center of the churning heavens, the Heart of Sky.
Notes:
1Linda Schele and David Freidel, unlike most Mayanists, continue to support the work of
Floyd Lounsbury in promoting the 584285 correlation. This is 2 days off from the
Thompson correlation that I use. The decisive factor in supporting the Thompson
correlation of 584283 is the fact that it corresponds with the tzolkin count still followed
in the highlands of Guatemala. To account for this discrepency in his correlation,
Lounsbury claims that the count was shifted back two days sometime before the
conquest (not likely), thus explaining its present placement. This means that either
correlation will give the December 21st end date. Nevertheless, Schele and Freidel still
report that the end date is December 23rd, 2012 rather than Dec. 21st, an unfortunate
faux pas understandable only because they aren't particularly interested in the specifics
of the correlation debate. For a detailed discussion of this topic, refer to my book
Tzolkin: Visionary Perspectives and Calendar Studies.
2Case in point is the mysterious existence of myths obviously describing precession in
the ancient verses of the Kalevala, the Finnish National Epic. These myths were relayed
from the earliest times by way of singers. Many of these stories are thoroughly magical
and are filled with sky lore. The Finnish language is not of Indo- European origin and
up until the late 19th century peasants in Finland and northwestern Russia had little
contact with Europe. Indeed, their heritage suggests more contact with Central Asia
than Europe. Some of the Kalevala stories describe a sacred Mill called the Sampo
(derived from sanskrit Skambha = pillar or pole) with a "many ciphered cover". This
spinning Mill is a metaphor for a Golden Age of plenty and the starry sky spinning
around the Pole Star (known as the Nail of the North), which in the Far North is almost
straight over head. The Mill at some point is disturbed, its pillar being pulled out of its
peg, and a new one - a new "age" - must be constructed. This becomes the chore of
Ilmarinen, the primeval smith. In this legend, ancient knowledge of precession among
unsophisticated "peasants" who were nonetheless astute skywatchers, was preserved
via oral tradition almost down to modern times.
3EZCosmos is a graphic software package that can accurately plot and animate the
positions of planets, stars, nebula and so on, for 14,000 years. It is well suited to this
research because it accounts for precession in its positional calculations. It also happens
to be the software that Linda Schele used to discover the astronomical meaning of the
Mayan Sacred Tree.
4 Here we briefly converge with the ideas of Terence McKenna. In the book he co-
authored with his brother Dennis (Invisible Landscape, Seabury Press 1975 and Harper
San Francisco, 1993), Terence suggests that the position of winter solstice sun within 3
degrees of the Galactic Center in the year 2012 A.D. (a "once-in-a-precessional- cycle"
event) may provide the eschatological end point for his theory of time known as
Timewave Zero. His end date was chosen for historical reasons and was, apparently,
only later discovered to correspond with the Mayan end date. The McKennas point out
that this unusual astronomical situation has been noted by other writers, namely,
Giorgio de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend in Hamlet's Mill (1969). As ACS
Publication's The American Ephemeris for the 21st Century shows, in the year 2012 the
Galactic Center is at 27 Sagittarius (within 3 of winter solstice). Thus McKenna
demonstrates that on winter solstice of 2012, Galactic Center will be rising heliacally
just before dawn, in a way reminiscent of how the Maya observed Venus's last
morningstar appearance.
5This basically follows the "1 degree every 72 years" rule of precession. In this way,
back in 3114 B.C. the sun conjuncted the Sacred Tree on Oct 10th, which is 72 degrees,
or 1/5th of the ecliptic from the winter solstice. The Fall Equinox sun conjuncted the
Sacred Tree about 6400 years ago (1/4th of a precessional cycle). Ancient cultures in
Mesopotamia may have recognized this alignment, and called it a Golden Age. The fall
from this state of alignment may be responsible for the original Fall from Paradise myth,
which filtered out to the Judaic tradition.
6The Long Count has other strange astronomical properties. For instance, the 13- katun
cycle of 256 years was known to the Yucatec Maya as a prophecy cycle. We see it used
in the Books of Chilam Balam. The astronomical reference here is to conjunction cycles
of Uranus and Pluto, two of which equal 256 years. From another angle, 3 katuns equal
exactly 37 synodical cycles of Venus.
Sources:
Brotherston, Gordon. The Book of the Fourth World. Cambridge University Press. 1992.
Edmonson, Munro. The Book of the Year. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City, Utah.
1988.
EZCosmos. Astrosoft, Inc. DeSoto, Texas. 1990.
Jenkins, John Major. Tzolkin: Visionary Perspectives and Calendar Studies. Borderlands
Science and Research Foundation. Garberville, CA. 1994.
Mayan Calendrics. Dolphin Software. 48 Shattuck Square #147, Berkeley, CA. 94704.
1989 &1993.
Meeus, Jean. Astronomical Tables of the Sun, Moon and Planets. Willmann- Bell
Publishers. Richmond, VA. 1983.
Michelsen, Neil F. The American Ephemeris for the 21st Century. ACS Publications. San
Diego, CA. 1982, 1988.
Ridpath, Ian (ed.). Norton's 2000.0: Star Atlas and Reference Handbook. Longman
Group UK Limited. 1989.
Schele, Linda and Freidel, David. A Forest of Kings: The Untold Story of the Ancient
Maya. William Morrow and Company, Inc. New York. 1990.
Schele, Linda; Freidel, David; Parker, Joy. Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the
Shaman's Path. William Morrow and Company, Inc. New York. 1993.
Tedlock, Dennis. The Popol Vuh: The Definitive Edition of the Mayan Book of the Dawn
of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings. Simon & Schuster. New York.
1985
Author's Biographical Information:
John Major Jenkins (March 4th, 1964, 9:19 p.m., Chicago) is a student of Mayan time.
On several trips to Central America in the late 80's, he worked and lived with the
Quich» and Tzutujil Maya in Guatemala. Observations gathered on these trips were
published in Chicago area newspapers. Since then he has devoted his time to studying
Mayan cosmo-conception and the mathematical and philosophical properties of the
sacred calendar. More thought provoking ideas can be found in his recent book Tzolkin:
Visionary Perspectives and Calendar Studies (Borderlands Science and Research
Foundation, 1994). Additional information on the Mayan end date alignment is available
by writing the author at Four Ahau Press: P.O. Box 3; Boulder, CO 80306. Four Ahau
Web Site
________________________________________
Go Hyperborea.
McKenna home page
Other writers who have written about the alignment
________________________________________
As I wrote in Appendix 1 to Maya Cosmogenesis 2012, I am not the first to recognize
that a solstice-galaxy alignment looms before us. Others include:
Terence McKenna
Daniel Giamario
Ray Mardyks
James Roylance
Nick Fiorenza
Moira Timms
Jose Arguelles writes of "Galactic alignment," but it's not clear in his writings if he's
referring to the solstice-galaxy alignment. He probably is, but my work is very different
in nature than his. I've sought to prove that the Maya intended their 2012 end-date
(which was determined when they created the Long Count calendar some 2100 years
ago) to mark the solstice-galaxy alignment by identifying how and where the Maya
incorporated the solstice-galaxy alignment into their traditions and institutions
These writers have all recognized the solstice-galaxy alignment as an important
transformative event. Again, I don't claim to be the first. What I do claim is to have
explained how the image-concept of the alignment - an alignment of the solstice sun
with the Milky Way - was incorporated into Maya institutions such as the Creation myth,
the ballgame, and king accession rites. In sorting through and synthesizing data from
the academic literature, I offer overwhelming proof that the Maya intentionally placed
the end of their 13-baktun cycle in A.D. 2012 to mark the alignment of the solstice sun
with the Milky Way. Furthermore, I identify that the Maya believed that era-2012 would
be a time of great transformation. Given that our current era is a time of great change,
unparalleled in known history, I also suggest that perhaps there is truth behind this
Maya belief.
